Yesterday, May 18th,
was my 22nd wedding anniversary.My husband, Andy, spent it in Wisconsin
participating in a 100 mile bike ride called, somewhat appropriately, Arcadia’s Brute.I, on the other hand, went to Art-A-Whirl in Northeast
Minneapolis to look at art and buy yet another set of
earrings.I can’t help myself.

Yes, we’re talking
romantic folks!If there’s anything I’d
say about a marriage lasting this long is that flexibility is key.Sure, we spent the first couple anniversaries
joined together at the hip but after that our independent spirits took over (we
married when we were in our 30’s) and we decided that we didn’t need to be
together on that exact day in order to have a meaningful celebration of our
marriage.

The day after our
anniversary, I cooked dinner but not until Andy got home from a model car show
he went to earlier in the day and I came home from brunch with a friend.Priorities, priorities!

Now you may be wondering
what on earth a French dish was doing paired with a recipe from a Winnie-the-Pooh cookbook and so I’ll
tell you that it all connects to our wedding and honeymoon.At our wedding, my father-in-law read from
Anne Morrow Lindberg’s Gift from the Sea.The late, great Webster Martin had a
wonderful reading voice and gave a thoughtful delivery of the section we chose.

And then my Aunt Mary,
“Auntie Mare,” got up and with the straightest of faces intoned “This is a
reading from Winnie-the-Pooh,” and
then cracked up laughing.I cannot
recall exactly what the section of Winnie-the-Pooh
was that we selected but I do recall we saw it on a greeting card and thought
it made for a fun and different wedding reading.I loved reading Winnie-the-Pooh as a kid although I was always afraid of the
“heffalumps” until I was older and realized they were elephants. And so what
the heck, you like something, you add it to your wedding reading list.

As to the honeymoon, Andy
and I managed to score incredibly inexpensive airline tickets to Paris (much
cheaper than any domestic flights) and so in another “what the heck moment,” we
booked a flight to Paris, then took a train trip to northern Italy (Venice and
Florence), another train trip through the Italian and French Riviera with a stop
in Provence to visit a friend and then back up to Paris.It was exhausting and crazy fun all rolled
into one although sadly, we haven’t been back since.And so we bien mange (eat well) at home
instead.

Many of the recipes in the
French cookbook sounded oh-so-tasty and I vacillated between a recipe for
Chicken Stew Nicoise, a recipe with tomatoes, olives and white wine and the one
I made, Coq au Vin, a heartier dish with mushrooms, pearl onions and red wine
before deciding that red wine wins.Plus, the weather was on the stormy side (a complete understatement for
the deluge and flash flood I got caught in) and the heartier dish felt cozier
than the other.Plus I like red wine and
hey, if you have to add three cups of wine to a dish, it should be something
you like to drink, n’cest pas? (Isn’t it so?)

As to dessert, finding
something to make from the Pooh cookbook wasn’t hard at all as this recipe
combines my favorites – chocolate and honey (or, as Pooh would say “hunny”)
with whipped cream thrown in for good measure.The author cautions us that this is a very sweet pie but you know what,
it didn’t taste that way at all.We
pronounced it a grand success.And in
keeping with our French theme, the French word for honeymoon is “lune de miel,”
“miel” being the French word for honey (and “lune” is moon).Go ahead and say it with me:“Awwwww…..”

Both of these dishes were
very good (c’est tres bon) but I do have a major change I suggest making to the
chicken dish and that is after baking it or simmering it for the required time
(45-60 minutes), remove the chicken and simmer the remaining
wine/mushroom/onion mixture for a good half hour to hour to reduce the
sauce.Our initial reaction to the dish,
eaten straight out of the oven, was that it was okay but not grand as the wine
sauce was too watery.But then I reduced
the sauce and it was much, much better.

So that’s my anniversary
dinner for me and my honey (“hunney”).As Pooh always said “It’s so much more friendly with two.”

Coq au Vin (Chicken in red wine) – serves 4

¼ lb bacon, cut into cubes

2 T butter

3 lbs chicken pieces

12 small white onions,
peeled and left whole

2 cups mushrooms, sliced

2 bay leaves

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 bouquet garni (this is
typically a mix of thyme, bay leaves, and parsley, tied together, usually in
cheesecloth that you then submerge into the liquid.)

Fry the bacon until it has
browned and rendered its fat and, with a slotted spoon, remove from the
pan.Next add the butter to the fat and
melt over a gentle heat.When the foam
subsides, add the chicken joints and fry until golden on both sides.Remove them to a large flameproof
casserole.Fry the onions until a little
brown and then lightly fry the mushrooms.

Add the onions and
mushrooms to the casserole together with the bacon, garlic, bay leaves and
bouquet garni.Pour over the red wine
and season with black pepper and a little salt.Bring to a steady simmer over gentle heat.Add pieces of the beurre manie until the
sauce thickens, cover the casserole and continue cooking over a low heat OR
place in moderate oven, 350F until chicken is tender – about 45-60 minutes.

Ann’s Note:The sauce did not thicken like I wanted it to
so after cooking for 45-60 minutes, remove the chicken, put the remaining
wine/mushroom/onion mixture on the stove and simmer for an additional 30-60
minutes until the sauce is reduced.

Buy a ready-made pie shell
or make your own from any standard recipe or any of the piecrust mixes.If making your own, line the pie pan with the
pastry before starting the honey-chocolate mixture.

Melt the chocolate and
butter in the top of a double boiler.When melted, remove from the heat and blend in the evaporated milk,
stirring all the time.

In a mixing bowl blend
together the honey, sugar, cornstarch and salt.Beat in the eggs.Add this
mixture to the chocolate mixture slowly, beating all the time.Pour this filling into the waiting pie
shell.If you used a smaller pie shell
like I did, pour the remaining mixture into ramekins.

Bake the pie uncovered for
40 minutes then cover it lightly with aluminum foil and bake it 20 minutes more
until the top is puffed.Cracks
sometimes show in the center.

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About Me

Welcome to Collectible Cooking! My name is Ann Verme and I’ve been interested in cooking and food my whole life.
My love of food started early: my favorite toys were my Easy Bake Oven and my Betty Crocker Junior Baking Kit.
My first “collectible” cookbook was The Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book (copyright 1976), given to me by my mom during college, and after that, it was all over but the crying. I make frequent “buying” trips to some of my favorite cookbook stores in New York (links are posted on the blog) and try to collect wherever I go. I also authored a family cookbook and was co-project manager of the 1999-2000 Minneapolis-St. Paul Zagat Survey.
I currently have over 1000 cookbooks in my collection and it is my goal to cook my way through them, one recipe one book at a time!